Sheboygan Area School District, Kohler teachers salaries among highest

Jan. 13, 2013

Sheboygan Area School District Superintendent Joe Sheehan addresses parents and students at Sheboygan South High School recently regarding a new i-Pads initiative. Despite leading the 10th largest school district in the state, Sheehan's salary ranked 89th in the state in 2011, according to a Gannett Wisconsin Media analysis / Photo by Bruce Halmo/Sheboygan Press Media

Teacher salaries in the Sheboygan Area School District were higher on average last school year than in any other district ranked among the state’s 10 largest, while the Sheboygan superintendent’s salary was by far the lowest among those same districts, according to a review of salary records.

Several miles to the west, in the Kohler School District, teachers on average made nearly the same amount as their counterparts in Sheboygan, while Kohler’s superintendent earned just $30 less than Sheboygan’s, even though Sheboygan’s enrollment was about 16 times larger.

The numbers are part of a statewide trend where teacher and administrator salaries often don’t correspond with enrollment or geography, leaving wide disparities in teacher pay at Wisconsin’s public schools, based on an analysis of 2011-12 salary data by Gannett Wisconsin Media.

Districts have final say over their employee salaries, thus, the reasons for pay differences vary, though the experience and education level of staff, district budgets and the local economy often play a big role, school officials say.

In Sheboygan, which had the state’s 10th largest enrollment last school year, the average teacher’s salary of $62,300 ranked 13th highest among the state’s 423 districts.

School officials said that figure reflects the district’s approach of hiring the best and oftentimes most-experienced candidates available, rather than focusing on less-experienced — and thus lower salaried — teachers.

That approach has changed to some degree as budgets have been squeezed, school officials said, though the district still employs a relatively large number of senior-level teachers, including 183 who each earn $76,641. Statewide, only the Waukesha School District has more teachers at a single salary point making more, with 200 teachers at $78,000.

Sheboygan school leaders say it’s money well-spent.

“It’s all about return on investment,” School Board President David Gallianetti said. “To me, communities need to be investing in education, which hopefully will make our communities better in the long-run.”

(Page 2 of 2)

The district has tried to address Superintendent Joe Sheehan’s low pay relative to his peers, giving him an $8,000 raise for the 2012-13 school year. Prior to that, Sheehan had gone without a raise for four years — often at his insistence — as the district grappled with an ever-tightening budget.

As of last year, Sheehan’s salary ranked 89th in the state and well below that of administrators in similar-sized districts.

Ultimately, school board members said, the raise was needed to help retain Sheehan and bring the position’s salary more in line with the marketplace should Sheehan ever leave.

“As larger districts had openings, he was being contacted by those districts, who were saying, ‘listen, you have a a track record of quality, and you’re a good superintendent, and we need a good superintendent, and we can pay you right off the bat more than you’re currently making,’” Gallianetti said.

Last school year, the district’s then-Superintendent, Martin Lexmond, was paid $134,000, second in the county only to Sheehan’s $134,030. Lexmond left at the end of June to accept a job as the superintendent at the Shorewood School District, and was replaced by Quynh Trueblood.

Neither Trueblood nor members of the Kohler School Board returned phone calls seeking comment for this story.